The Still and The Quiet
by rantandrumour
Summary: He breathed her name again, and her hazel eyes moved towards him. He picked her head up into his lap, stroking his fingers through her hair and whispered to her gentle words of comfort and reassurance.


He stared at her as she lay on the ground, watching her breathe slowly in and out. She was slipping away. Life was ebbing out of her, second by second, and all he could do was watch. He couldn't help her. He couldn't even move. Her beautiful, perfect face was contorted in pain, but even that did not mar her stunning features. Her brunette hair fanned out underneath her head, mixing with the scarlet of blood. Not her blood, he noticed. No, it was the blood of another man, the man she had shot down just as he shot her.

He whispered her name, hearing her breathing coming more unsteadily even as sirens sounded in the distance. A bird was singing from somewhere in the trees. The tune was happy, joyous, a sharp contrast to the scene set before him. He knew that it was raining now; he could hear the drops hitting softly against the stones beneath his feet.

He could smell the blood on the pavement. The blood of the two bodies mingling together made a metallic odor that filled the air with its cloying scent. The memories of a hundred crime scenes attacked him, filling his mind with her comments towards him. All those crime scenes where she had been right next to him. His partner. And now she was there on the ground in front of him, looking just all those crime scenes that they had visited together.

Suddenly, his brain connected with his legs and he kneeled down next to her, his knees getting covered in blood, but he didn't care. He looked at her face, still twisted in agony. Her breathing was growing more and more erratic. She didn't seem to notice him, staring straight through him.

He breathed her name again, and her hazel eyes moved towards him. She stared unseeingly at him, her breaths now coming in short gasps. She tried to say his name, but it came out as garbled nonsense. Pity overwhelmed him as he heard it, and he picked her head up into his lap, stroking his fingers through her hair. Her hazel eyes gazed at him, slowly being rid of the pain as they went glassy.

Unable to help her in any other way, he whispered to her. As her gasping got louder, so did he, reminding her of all the times that they had worked together, all the times that they had gotten in arguments. He talked of their drunken nights in the trattoria and of the nights spent in her flat, merely enjoying each other's company.

He could feel her relaxing against him, knowing that she was feeling a numbness caused by the wound in her chest. He knew that the pain had ebbed away into nothing, and that now, her life was very near its end. Her gasps were getting fewer and further between, and her face was going slack.

He lowered his voice back to a whisper again, continuing to talk to her. He changed the topic, instead persuading her to try and hang on just a little longer, just until the ambulance arrived and could do something.

The sirens wailed ever closer, sounding like they were only a few streets away. He continued to whisper, pleading with her, begging her. He was glad that no one else was around to see him lose his power for this moment. Only she would know about this a few days from now. Although, she was hanging so close to the brink of death now, she may not remember anything.

His inner voice yelled at him, screamed that she shouldn't die, couldn't die. What would this world be without her? He knew that it would feel emptier than it had before, even emptier than when his previous partner died several years ago. She had come, changed his life by turning it upside down, and now, she was leaving. It was too difficult an idea to bear. A raw yell rose in his throat, filling the courtyard, evacuating the bird from the tree.

Her eyes flicked up towards him again, still staring blindly, and her mouth curved slightly. He could see the lipstick she had applied that morning, the pink barely noticeable on the curve of her lips. The bright blue eye makeup she wore every day was smeared from the tears of pain that had gathered in the corner of her eyes after she fell. She almost looked like she wanted to say something, but he knew that at this moment, there was no way she could possibly speak. She brought her lips together and pulled them apart, and he heard a gentle smacking sound. He smiled sorrowfully, and pulled his hand out of her hair, stroking her cheek soothingly. He knew that it was too late now, that the ambulance would arrive too late. She couldn't hang on that long.

Once more, he changed the words he spoke to her, no longer offering memories or encouragement. Now, he whispered gentle words of comfort, of reassurance. He listened to her as she gasped for air, each breath desperate and scared.

He felt despair ripping through his soul as he watched her slowly fade. It was so wrong that this had happened. She never should have been in the man's firing line. He should have been there, protecting her. He was supposed to be everywhere. How come he wasn't there, getting the bullet to the chest himself?

Her eyes were closed tight with the effort of drawing in each breath. He wished they weren't, knowing that after this moment, he'd never see the hazel again. He wanted to plead with her to open her eyes, but knew that she would be unable to.

Finally, the sound that he was dreading came. She exhaled for the last time, going completely limp in his arms. Anguish filled him as he pulled his hand off her chest, covered in her blood. He felt his eyes burn, but he blinked the tears back. Tears wouldn't bring her back. Tears never did anything. He stared once more at her beautifully perfect face, already pale from the amount of blood she had lost. With a shaking hand, he stroked her cheek once more, leaving a streak of scarlet to contrast against the pallor of her face.

The sirens were close. They were on the same street now. But it was too late.

~(*)~

He watched them lift the covered bodies from the scene, unwilling to move from the spot where he had moved when they needed to reach her. He hugged the red blanket around him, staring at the red liquid already being washed away by the rain. He knew he needed to go back to work, to answer the questions that were no doubt being asked already.

But he couldn't. All he could do was stare at the patch of her life that was being eradicated. He closed his eyes. It was all over. Everything that he had secretly wished was gone. Five minutes had changed his whole perspective on life. An overwhelming loneliness filled his soul, so completely devastating he felt his knees tremble. The Manc Lion was alone once more.

**Rant**


End file.
